Till I realized that Manmohan Singh is the 13th Prime Minister of India, I had not believed that 13 is a number of misfortune.
If you ever thought that to serve for 10 years as the Prime Minister of the largest democracy in the world, one would require enormous political acumen, dynamism, courage of commitment and shrewd skills of governance, you have now seen a man of irritating silence belie your beliefs. He did not speak a word that you would quote, did not do a thing that you would appreciate and did not change a thing that you would remember. It is often said that India contributed the digit 'zero' to the world of science and civilization. Now, here is a man who contributed 'zero' to the national life. He occupied an unforgettable time space in the history of this country but is not leaving behind anything unforgettable. Oh... perhaps that is his unforgettable contribution - the zero.
You have been lucky - we are an extraordinarily patient and forgiving people, Mr. Manmohan Singh. You sat fat over the burgeoning commodity prices in the country - chalo, maaf kar diya. You brought us down from being a growing global economic giant to a fumbling trade dwarf - chalo, maaf kar diya. You made corruption the most popular occupation of the country - chalo maaf kar diya. You broke the largest democratic anti-corruption movement by just your stoic silence and inaction - chalo maaf kar diya. And you stole 10 years of my children's life by driving our national lives into insignificance - chalo maaf kar diya.
But what this nation cannot forgive is your becoming a Nero from being Zero and fiddling with silence when our borders are burning the pyres of our soldiers. The enemy enters our national space and shoots down our sons who guard the country - and you don't speak a word! The enemy has roasted the valleys of our frontier states, routinely trespassed into our soils, beheaded and thrown the bodies of our men for the vultures to eat and made a mockery of a nation of over a billion people. Do you still want play the fiddle of silence and your facial melancholy?
Any other nation would have waged a war by now on the enemy to protect itself. Any other Head of State would have spoken like the true son of the soil to unify his country and focus his politics towards defending the motherland. It is a pity that in a country where a train accident would demand of the rail minister to resign and a crime in the city would demand of the chief of law and order to step down, an attack on the nation and killing of its soldiers routinely and repeatedly would not demand of its Prime Minister to even speak a word of courage.
Mr. Prime Minister, fiddle as you may when your home is on fire. You will soon be overcome and forgotten.
VK Saxena
President,
National Council For Civil Liberties,
Ahmedabad
